Just a few more days and we’re into February, month of the NFL’s Super Bowl LXV (February 6^th), Valentine’s Day (February 14^th), and the glam event of the year, The Oscars (February 27). Are you armed with the discounted gift cards that will keep it all affordable for you?

Discounted Gift Cards Available Now* on Plastic Jungle:

Victoria’s Secret Gift Cards – on sale up to 10% off face value

1-800-Flowers.com Gift Cards – on sale up to 30 % off face value

AMC Theatres Gift Cards – on sale up to 16% off face value

Bath & Body Works Gift Cards – on sale up to 13% off face value

bebe Gift Cards – on sale up to 10 % off face value

Ruth’s Chris Steak House Gift Cards – on sale up to 14% off face value

Sports Authority Gift Cards – on sale up to 14% off face value

iTunes Gift Cards – on sale up to 9% off face value

That’s a pretty good list, plus check out the huge list of discounted gift cards available now on Plastic Jungle. Act fast and buy right away: supplies are limited and don’t forget allow time for shipping a standard gift card. Plastic Jungle never charges for shipping. As well, eCODEs (eGift Cards) are emailed immediately (although can take up to 24 hours), without service or handling fees.

Let us know what your Valentine’s Day will include… a romantic dinner? a girls’ night out? the exchange of sporting goods? (A woman once told me that she and her fiancé exchanged skiis for Valentine’s Day; she was giddy with excitement with the news!) If you’ve got a great idea, we’ll post it here, and we’ll discuss ways you can save on the Valentine’s Day idea.

When none of that works out and you need an Oscar party date, think about Mattel’s Sweet Talking Ken. He’ll say what you want to hear, and if you trade in an old unused gift card, you could buy him with the Amazon.com Gift Card you could get. The perfect date!

*Discounts and gift card availability may vary.

As the web’s largest secured gift card exchange, we’ve seen the volume of gift cards exchanged on our site rise exponentially in the past year (see our Plastic Jungle blog post with figures). It’s exciting to see consumers finding great ways to save money time and time again.

During the holidays, we found that the top ten gift cards purchased on our site were from versatile retailers with many product lines to offer. Clearly, we’ve got a hot market if you’re willing to sell any of these gift cards. Check the Plastic Jungle “Sell Gift Cards” page to see what your exchange value will be.

Plastic Jungle’s Top 10 Gift Cards (in reverse order)

December 2010

10. Lowe’s

Check Plastic Jungle for Discounted Lowe’s Gift Cards Now

9. Best Buy

Check Plastic Jungle for Discounted Best Buy Gift Cards Now

8. Target

Check Plastic Jungle for Discounted Target Gift Cards Now

7. Kmart

Check Plastic Jungle for Discounted Kmart Gift Cards Now

6. Lands’ End

Check Plastic Jungle for Discounted Lands’ End Gift Cards Now

5. Home Depot

Check Plastic Jungle for Discounted Home Depot Gift Cards Now

4. iTunes

Check Plastic Jungle for Discounted iTunes Gift Cards Now

3. Sears

Check Plastic Jungle for Discounted Sears Gift Cards Now

2. Macy’s

1. Walmart

Check Plastic Jungle for Discounted Walmart Gift Cards Now

View gift cards you loved in January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, and Fall 2010.

Where do you love to shop (and save money)?

Plastic Jungle is all about saving you money at your favorite stores on your favorite products, every day: no gimmicks, safe, secure transactions, and on Fridays, we even give you a lively set of money-saving tips and gift card giveaways.

Based on this week’s collection of Internet sweepstakes and giveaways, retail is gearing up for romance and Valentine’s Day already. Already?! Just in case, it might make sense (while you’re thinking about it) to take a look at Plastic Jungle’s stock of discounted 1-800-FLOWERS Gift Cards and buy yourself a secret Valentine’s Day bargain in advance.

NFL Weekend Giveaway

But wait! What about football? This weekend’s NFL matchups, featuring the fearsome, ages-old rivalry between the Chicago Bears and the Green Bay Packers, and the haughty New York Jets vs. the hearty Pittsburgh Steelers, are a reason for a party on Sunday. For broadcast times and channels in your area, go to nfl.com/schedules, where you’ll also have the option of watching or listening to the games online. It all leads up to Super Bowl XLV, which takes place

on the Fox network, on Sunday, February 6.

Mission Foods has an Ultimate Win Football Sweepstakes that ends Saturday, 1/22/11, so hurry to enter! Grand Prize is a trip to football’s “Big Game” in Texas in Feb, three First Prizes are Sony HD LCD TVs, 10 Second Prizes are $100 ESPNShop.com Gift Cards (each). Check the rules and find the entry form on the link above. (So far, Super Bowl sweepstakes seem hard to come by, but I hope to have more for you next week. Meantime, stock up on Super Bowl party supplies with discounted gift cards from Costco, Target, Walmart, or your local grocery store that you can buy here on Plastic Jungle.)

iTunes Giveaways & Savings

How about a BIG win? Apple’s iTunes Apps Store is looking forward to their 10 billionth (10B!!) download soon. To celebrate, they are giving away a $10,000 iTunes Gift Card to whoever downloads the 10 billionth App, or to the person who submits the non-purchase entry after the download of the 9,999,999,999th App, whichever comes first. That’s right, you don’t have to buy an App to enter. Check the iTunes App Store’s Countdown to 10 billion Apps giveaway rules for more details.

If you’re looking for a little freebie to load up your digital media, with the Power Your Playlist Giveaway, get a free $10 iTunes Gift Card when you redeem three codes from the packs of specially marked Energizer batteries (here’s a list and rules). The Power Your Playlist Giveaway codes are only found on the promotional Energizer packs available now. Just register on the Energizer site by 1/31/11 and enter your codes to get your free $10 iTunes Gift Card.

The fastest way to get a discount on iTunes is to purchase a discounted iTunes Gift Card at Plastic Jungle. If none are in stock, set an alert to be the first to be notified when the come up for grabs.

Prom Dress Giveaway

Valentine’s Day is for exchanging class rings or pins, and its follow-up parties, including Spring Semi-Formal or Prom, can be torturous for girls who want to go, but perhaps can’t afford a dress. The Windsor Store is sponsoring the Cinderella Project: Prom Dress Gift Card Giveaway, a gift card giveaway for teens (anyone under 18 must have their parent or guardian’s permission to enter). The Cinderella Project: Prom Dress Gift Card Giveaway hands a $100 Windsor Store Gift Card to 10 winners (each) so they can buy a prom dress on the site. Details are described by Windsor’s party-dress guru, Missglamorazzi on YouTube’s Windsor channel. To enter, you choose you subscribe to their YouTube channel, and go to the Windsor Store site to pick out your fave prom dress and leave a comment about it. Fun, right? Frugal junior fashionistas should also know that Windsor is a hot destination for affordable dresses under $100, sale dresses, as well as dresses at all price points for all occasions. The contest is open to residents of the US and Canada, and the contest ends on 1/31/2011; winners are announced on Valentine’s Day via text video.

Barbie’s Sweet Talkin’ Ken Giveaway

Barbie’s best date Ken is now kissing and telling. Well… he’s wearing a T-shirt that says “the perfect boyfriend” in 10 different languages, and he is able to record up to five seconds of sound so that he can play back a personal message just for you. Leave it to ElleGirl magazine to give away five of the mini-guys to lucky winners. Just enter ElleGirl’s Sweet Talkin’ Ken Giveaway by 2/11/11; use the same link to enter and read giveaway rules. For more on the Sweet Talkin’ Ken doll and to vote on whether or not Barbie should take Ken back (it’s all in good fun) go to BarbieandKen.com. Be the first to share that site amongst your friends for a good laugh.

Just FYI, uber-date Sweet Talkin’ Ken doll gets a 5-star review on Amazon.com, where he is currently in stock and ships for free. You can get Ken by exchanging an unused gift card for an Amazon.com Gift Card here on Plastic Jungle. Just go to “Sell Gift Cards” on our main page, and follow the instructions.

Enjoy the weekend!

Perhaps you’ve read the articles: more and more people aren’t bothering to re-gift or even tuck their unwanted gift cards into their wallet this year. They are selling or exchanging them for cash or credits as soon as possible. Why? It’s a good cure for a holiday shopping hangover.

With all the focus on consumer spending this last holiday season, everyone from local TV news (KTRK-TV an ABC affiliate in Houston, TX) to savvy Internet news sites (CNNMoney.com) is reporting on the gift card trend. With so many cards flying around, it could mean that even when people are given a gift card to a store they love, it may very well be that they can’t use it. Let me tell you why:

1)      Fund allocation. Times are tight, and while a $50 gift card for iTunes is much appreciated, the exchange value (especially here on Plastic Jungle) is worth so much more in calm nerves and a paid PG&E bill.

2)      Time allocation. Macaroni Grill might be your family’s favorite restaurant, but getting everyone together to enjoy it is like herding cats. By turning in the card and purchasing a discounted card to the local grocery store, everyone gets the dinner they want at 5 pm, 7 pm and 9 pm, or as they run in and out of the kitchen.

3)      Suffering from Holiday Shopping Hangover. They just purchased the items they were dying to get or couldn’t possibly think of heading to the mall for another four months. Um, yes, it’s true: we tend to shop for ourselves during the holidays. Maybe the necklace they wanted at Macy’s was on fire sale and they couldn’t resist; maybe it was very convenient to get the Kenmore appliance at Sears last month; the Sony laptop and all accessories were begging for purchase at Best Buy while they were at the store picking up Best Buy Gift Cards for all their neighbors. Suddenly, the $100 Macy’s Gift Card looks like it might not see the light of day until another dress situation comes up, and it would be better just to cash it in, load their PayPal account, and pay a bill.

So if you’re on the Plastic Jungle site and wondering, “Who would give up that credit at Victoria’s Secret – especially NOW when they’re having a huge SALE?” (and yes, the sale goes through 11:59 pm EST on January 23, 2011).

Here on Plastic Jungle you can rest assured that your gift card purchase is always safe, and there will be no gift card maintenance fees or expirations dates to worry about.  Further, when you sell or exchange gift cards on Plastic Jungle, it’s a guaranteed transaction with no fees or even shipping to pay.

So pick up that Victoria’s Secret gift card: go ahead and calculate the added savings on top of the up-to-50% off you’ll get at Victoria’s Secret. [At time of writing, Plastic Jungle has a fat selection Victoria’s Secret Gift Cards and eCODES (electronic gift cards) on sale at a 10% discount off face value. When you combine a discounted gift card + Victoria’s Secret sale savings, you could save up to 60% on merchandise today.]

What’s your reason for selling or exchanging your gift cards? We’d love to hear your story.